Excellent Things About Malaysian Food

Clearly, Malaysian food is greatly affected by Thai, Chinese, Indonesian and Indian cuisine. These influences expand from using the wok to the blends of spices used in many popular dishes.

Malaysian cuisine has an enormous range – also makes it difficult to classify all. This may be tricky for restaurateurs but we should adopt it.

It is reasonable to say Malaysian food is not spectacularly recognizable to most people in other countries. The dish most often linked to the state may be the rich dry coconut curry, beef rendang, a traditional Malay recipe, while many cuisines – from Nyonya, a distinguishing Chinese/Malay style of cooking, to that of the Native peoples of Malaysian Borneo – are much less well known.

But most of us will be better acquainted with facts of the nation’s cooking than we realize, due to the many styles of Indian and Chinese cuisine that thrive there. And there is an abundance of nearby regional recipes which were assimilated, so visitors will encounter several famous dishes, like roti canai, satay chicken skewers, and laksa. To add to the confusion, such classic dishes are occasionally cooked in the traditional style of their home country, and occasionally given the treatment of the cook’s own culture so not only are you going to find, for example, Chinese restaurants serving traditional Malay dishes, you’ll locate Malay – and other – eateries serving versions of Thai, Chinese, Indian, and Indonesian dishes.

When it comes to Malaysian restaurants in Australia, there are comparatively several selections. Typical Malay dishes are frequently hot or spicy, in comparison with other nations in Southeast Asia. Most Malaysian cuisine chefs frequently consider the degree of spiciness into dishes. Should you be trying to find actual hot dishes or less hot, tell the servants up front you want your own dish hot or not spicy. Same goes for non-Malay dishes (like Indian or Chinese food); make them know up front you need it spiced up a little. But beware; some dishes can be incredibly hot, so be sure to have enough water within reach. Some well-known Malaysian dishes are Ikan Bakar, Nasi Lemak, Nasi Goreng, Wan Tan Mee, Marmite Chicken, Sateh, Carrot cake, Dimsum and Beef Rendang.

Most Malaysian dishes are either based on rice or mee. Malay cuisine frequently includes steak, chicken, mutton or fish; but never pork as Malay food must be halal. Chinese dishes frequently includes pork. Indian dishes are generally vegetarian; and they never include steak (though Indians do eat chicken, mutton, and fish). Most dishes will be served with some vegetables; either combined through the dish or served as a side dish.

As elsewhere in Asia, rice is an essential basic. Local or Thai rice is the most common, but Indian basmati is employed in biryani dishes. Nasi lemak (‘oily rice’), a dish of rice steamed with coconut milk and served with dried anchovies (Ikan Bilis), peanuts, hard boiled eggs, dried shrimp, cucumber, and sambal, is considered Malaysia’s national dish and may be eaten for breakfast, lunch or dinner. It is served with a choice of curries or a popular hot meat stew (typically, though not consistently, steak) known as rendang. Noodles are another popular starch basic, as are Indian bread like roti canai, idli, puri and dhosa, which can be eaten with breakfast.